


Ain't it just like you to kiss me (and then hit the road)

by Little_oblivion



Category: Women's Soccer RPF
Genre: Angst, Breaking Up & Making Up, Car Accidents, F/F, House Party, Non Graphic, Underage Drinking, character injuries, drunken jealousy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:53:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24574867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Little_oblivion/pseuds/Little_oblivion
Summary: Christen likes Tobin, but she also drives her crazy. Tobin like Christen, but she also pisses her off. So sometimes they're together, but sometimes they're not.And then one night, drunken jealousy makes them both open their eyes
Relationships: Tobin Heath/Christen Press
Comments: 10
Kudos: 161





	Ain't it just like you to kiss me (and then hit the road)

**Author's Note:**

> Hi. It's me. Jordon. I was talking on tumblr yesterday about how I was writing so much fluff that I was having an identity crisis, and it spurred me to finally complete this angsty one shot that I've been sitting on for a week or so.
> 
> Read them tags, folks!
> 
> Title comes from I Want It All-Arctic Monkeys

It was a sticky hot night, the kind that makes your clothes stick to your skin. School would be out in a few weeks and then Christen Press would spend her summer poolside, soaking in the Los Angeles sun and making her way through her AP Lit’s summer reading list. She already had plans to go on a few hikes with Alex before the older girl set off for college, and she was happy to say that every facet of the next three months was looking perfect.

Well, with one tiny exception.

She could see Tobin against the far wall of the living room, talking and laughing with Ashlyn, her snapback firmly in place over her long brown hair. They had been locked in this frustrating on again, off again, will they, won’t they tug of war since Tobin had first transferred halfway through their sophomore year. There was something about her laid back, hard chill vibe that drew Christen in, time after time, even though it also drove her crazy.

Christen didn’t leave anything to chance. She lived a regimented, color coded life and it had made her passably perfect, a girl with impeccable grades, a spot on the cheerleading squad, and a face and body that made girls and boys alike pay attention. She needed order, she craved it, and this in turn drove her stoner sometimes-girlfriend up the wall.

They were currently almost on again. Christen had found a very sweet note tucked into her locker the day before, and the two had subsequently ended up in the backseat of Christen’s mazda, locked at the lips, hands jammed beneath each other’s clothes, desperate to get off before someone came along and saw them.

Christen grabbed her plastic cup full of monster juice (a truly terrible concoction that contained untold amounts of alcohol) and sauntered across the room to Tobin.

“Hi,” she smiled.

“Hey yourself,” Tobin smirked. “Having fun?”

“Can’t complain. You?”

“Mm, I would like to lodge a formal complaint.”

“What’s that?”

Tobin leaned in slightly closer. “It’s been hours since I last kissed you.”

Ashlyn fake gagged next to them, breaking their intense eye contact. “Hi Ash,” Christen said, rolling her eyes.

“Oh hey! Did you just realize that I’m standing here too?”

“Where’s Ali?”

“Grounded,” she huffed. “She missed curfew one time and her parents acted like she stole a goddamn car.”

“Ugh, that sucks, sorry.”

“Can I come over tonight?” Tobin asked, leaning forward to hook a finger through the belt loop on Christen’s skirt.

“Chris!” She turned to see Becky gesturing to her. “Come be on my beer pong team!”

She leaned forward and kissed Tobin’s cheek, whispering in her ear, “My window is always open for you.” She sauntered towards Becky, throwing Tobin a look over her shoulder.

They ended up losing badly (so Christen wasn’t good at everything, sue her) and Christen refilled her cup. She didn’t see Tobin in the living room and decided to check around for her.

She wasn’t in the kitchen, wasn’t in any of the upstairs bedrooms. Christen checked the laundry room at the back of the house, squinting through the thick haze of pot smoke, and Ashlyn lazily suggested she check the backyard.

Her eyes landed on Tobin as soon as she stepped through the sliding doors and her blood began to boil. Tobin was sitting on a lounger next to the pool, and some blonde girl (Lindsey? Abby? Kristie?) was next to her, legs across her lap. Tobin was smiling and the girl was leaning in close, their faces veering dangerously close to each other. Tobin brushed the blonde’s hair behind her ear and glanced up, her face falling when she locked eyes with Christen.

Christen spun on her heels and stomped up the stairs, shoving past the dumb boys guffawing about nothing. She went to the second door on the left, the room she had just seen her best friend in and threw open the door. “Kelley, you will never fucking BELIEVE-”

She flicked on the lights and was cut off a short squeal as the inhabitants of the room rushed to cover themselves. Well, Emily did, anyway, grabbing a pillow and hastily pulling it over her bare chest as her face flushed red. Kelley just whipped around in her sports bra to scowl at Christen.

“Chris!”

“She’s seriously flirting with another girl right in front of me!”

Kelley scrubbed at her face. “You did not just bust in here to complain about Tobin-”

“I mean, what the fuck? She writes me that note and now-”

“Nope. Not tonight. I’m sorry but I can’t do this tonight.”

Christen froze. “What?”

“I’m serious, Chris. I love you, but for the love of GOD please leave.”

“Kelley!”

“Christen!”

“Did you not hear me? She’s cheating on me-”

“No, she’s not, because you two aren’t technically together right now-”

“Are you seriously blowing me off right now to hook up with Sonnett?”

Kelley came to her feet. “Christen if I had to stop my life anytime drama went down with you and Tobin I would never get laid again. Just go home and pout about it, I’m sure she’ll come over and apologize tomorrow.”

“You’re not listening to me,” Christen began.

“Chris, I will gladly listen to you cry over Tobin’s dumb ass tomorrow, but please just leave!”

She did as she was told, slamming the door behind her. She stormed back downstairs and found herself face to face with Pinoe. “Woah, you alright Pressy?”

“I need another drink.”

Pinoe grinned. “Alright, I can fix that!” She bounded across the room and filled another cup with more monster juice and handed it to Christen who downed it. “You… okay?” Pinoe asked, her eyebrows raised.

“I wanna dance.” Christen grabbed her hand and dragged her into the midst of their classmates. She began to shake her hips, grinding to the beat of the music, and Pinoe joined in after a moment, eyeing her apprehensively.

After several songs, she grabbed another drink even though she was already feeling tipsier than she had anticipated getting tonight. She choked it down, her chest still burning at the mental image of Tobin and the blonde girl.

“Chris.” She turned her head to see Tobin, her eyebrows furrowed even though her eyes were glassy and red.

“What?” she bit back.

“Will you just talk to me? It’s not what it-”

“Not what it looked like? Because it looked like you were about to make out with that blonde skank.”

“Hey, don’t call her-”

“Y’know what, _Toby_? How about you just leave me alone?”

“Chris stop. Look… you’re drunk-”

“And you’re stoned!”

“Yeah! But you’re being…” Tobin gestured fruitlessly. “I didn’t do anything! I was just talking to Linds-”

“Yeah, just talking, that’s sure what it looked like.”

“We were!”

“Oh yeah? Well guess what, I can just talk too.”

Christen turned and grabbed the first person she saw, a dude who was in her chemistry class, and yanked him towards her before stretching up on her tip toes and kissing him hard.

When she pulled away and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, she turned to find Tobin watching her in disbelief. “You’re… wow, Chris. You know what? Go fuck yourself. We’re done.”

She turned and began to push through the crowd, Ashlyn a few steps behind her. Christen felt guilt begin to creep into her bloodstream, trying to overshadow the alcohol, and she followed.

As she was clumsily making her way off of the porch, she watched as Tobin got in her SUV, slamming the door. The car roared to life and Ashlyn just managed to open the back door and get inside before Tobin was peeling out. Christen went to her own car, fishing her keys out of her pocket.

“Pressy stop, don’t do this.”

“I… fuck, I have to go after her. Why did I kiss that guy? Why do I do this? Why am I such a bitch?” She got in the car and haphazardly pulled on her seatbelt, the movement ingrained in her muscle memory even as she mumbled to herself.

“I don’t think you should drive-” Pinoe said, leaning into the car.

“Pinoe either get in or shut the door! I have to go after her, I need to apologize.”

Pinoe got in with a huffy breath, and Christen threw the car into drive. “I really don’t… look, she’s with Ash! Maybe she just needs time, time to think, and you can talk later, you don’t, you don’t need to drive after her, don’t need to drive at all,” Pinoe tried to reason from the passenger seat, her voice slurring slightly.

“No, I hurt her.” Tears caught in her throat and Christen swallowed them down as best as she could. “I have to make this right.” She turned a corner sharply and spotted Tobin’s beat up old SUV ahead of them. “There!”

Unfortunately, it seemed as though Tobin had spotted them too, because she turned down a side road and sped up. Christen did the same, determined to follow her wherever she was going.

Then, as if in slow motion, there was a flash of something white and grey up ahead, and Tobin’s SUV veered to one side as she tried to swerve out of the deer’s path, instead skidding straight into a tree on the side of the road with a deafening crash. Christen screamed and tried to slow down but within a few seconds her car was colliding into the back of Tobin’s SUV, and everything went black.

She woke up in a room almost completely quiet apart from a beeping near her head. She blinked her eyes open, giving a soft groan when a throbbing headache makes itself known.

“Moe?” she turned her head slightly to see her parents at her side, mascara smudged under her mom’s eyes.

“What-” She tried to take in a deep breath but winced as pain bloomed across her chest.

“Careful, careful, the doctors said you’re going to need to take it easy,” her mom said as she took her hand.

“My head hurts,” Christen whimpered.

“Yeah. Getting hit with an airbag will do that,” her dad said evenly.

Airbag. Tiny flashes started to make their way to the front of Christen’s mind: the steady droning of a horn, the scattered rad and blue lights hurting her eyes as she was pulled from her car, what sounded an awful lot like Pinoe crying. She lifted her eyes guiltily to find her parents staring hard at her.

“What in God’s name were you thinking, Christen? Not only drinking at seventeen, but then getting behind the wheel of a car? Have you lost your mind?”

“I’m sorry-” she began, but her dad cut her off.

“This is not an ‘I’m sorry,’ situation! You could have died! Megan could have died!”

“How, how is she? And Tobin, Ash? What happened?”

Her mom cleared her throat. “They’re all alive. Megan is down the hall. Ashlyn is further down and Tobin’s on the floor above us.”

“Are they hurt?” she whispered.

“Of course they’re hurt, Christen. You were all under the influence, and you were the only one who was wearing a seatbelt.”

“Oh my god… oh my god, this all my fault.” Her breathing was beginning to speed up.

“What were you even doing? Why were you driving?”

“I… I messed up. I was mad, so I was trying to make her jealous, but then she was so upset, I had to go after her…”

“You’re supposed to be a role model, Christen. And instead, what are you doing? Partying? Driving under the influence? Totaling your car? Can you even comprehend the amount of trouble you’re in?”

“Mom, I said I was sorry-”

“Not just with us, Christen! You’re a minor being charged with a DUI!” Her dad said, his voice growing louder. “Bare minimum, they’re going to suspend your license. Worst case scenario? Juvie, possible even actual jail time. It’ll depend on the judge, but you’re probably going to be spending months doing community service, you’ll be on probation, we’re probably going to face thousands of dollars in fines. Which you will be paying for, by the way, along with all of the charges insurance hands down. You’re lucky someone didn’t die, Christen, you could be facing vehicular manslaughter.”

An alarm started beeping on Christen’s heart monitor, and after a few seconds a nurse bustled into the room.

“Okay, let’s everyone calm down. Christen, slow breathing for me…”

Kelley came and visited that afternoon, her face uncharacteristically still and serious. She held onto Christen’s hand like she was afraid she would disappear.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry I blew you off.”

“Don’t.” Christen tried to shrug but winced when the movement made her chest ache with pain. “I was being unreasonable. Everything about last night…” She sighed. “I wish I could do the whole night over.”

Kelley sniffed. “I um… I had just gotten my clothes back on when my phone started ringing. My dad was on the EMS crew that came to the wreck. As soon as he saw your car, he called my mom, told her you had been in the accident. So she was calling me, afraid that I had been in the backseat and had been thrown out. And I was so scared, Chris, I didn’t know how badly you were hurt…”

Christen squeezed her hand. “I’m sorry.”

“What did the doctors say?”

“Concussion. A few cuts. This crazy bruise from my seatbelt.” She pulled the gown so that Kelley could see.

“Holy shit.”

“Yeah. She sat up a little straighter. “Hey uh, wanna do me a favor?”

“Sure, anything.”

“I wanna go see the other girls. Help me get out of this bed.”

Kelley did as she asked, and after scaring the shit out of the nurses by taking off her heart rate monitor and making it flatline, they provided a wheelchair for Kelley to push her in.

First up was Pinoe. She seemed happy to see them, but Christen’s eyes couldn’t leave the sling she was wearing.

“Is it broken?”

“My collarbone is. The sling is just to hold my arm in place while it heals. Other than that, I got pretty lucky, just a concussion and all of these super tough looking bruises and cuts.” She tried to give them a fierce look, but failed when the effort made her grimace with pain.

“I’m really sorry, Pinoe.”

“You tried to stop in time.”

“But, but I never should have been driving in the first place.”

“Don’t sweat it, Press. I mean, I’m the one who got in with you. I’m the one who didn’t put on her fucking seat belt. It could be a lot worse.”

“Still.”

“Are your parents mad?”

Pinoe gave a half smile. “Yes and no. I mean, the one saving glory of having an older brother who’s a bit of a fuck up means they have a high threshold for this kind of stuff.”

“Yeah.”

“Sue was not impressed.”

“I bet. I’m surprised she’s not here.”

“She’s on her way home from a tournament, as soon as she gets back to campus she’s gonna head this way.”

“Gonna come knock some sense into you?” Kelley tried to joke.

“I mean, she can try, but I can’t guarantee it’ll work.”

Next was Ashlyn. She was wearing sunglasses, protecting her eyes from the light due to a severe concussion, and her wrist was in a black cast.

“Hey Ash.” Christen glanced to the side of the room where Ali was sitting in a chair with her arms crossed. “Hey Ali.”

Ali pointedly ignored her, instead glaring at the wall.

“She’s a little mad, don’t take it personally,” Ashlyn stage whispered.

“A little mad? You could have fucking died, Ashlyn!” she seethed.

“Babe-”

“Do not call me that right now.”

Ashlyn did a mock salute, wiggling her eyebrows at Christen and Kelley behind the sunglasses. “Yes ma’am.”

“This is not the time!” Ali stormed out of the room.

Ashlyn sighed, fiddling with the sheets with her good hand. “She was really scared, but she doesn’t want to show it,” she said quietly.

“Yeah. How are you feeling?”

“My head hurts like a bitch. My Grandma was here this morning, she’s really disappointed. Haven’t seen either of my parents yet. Don’t know if I will.” Her bottom lip trembled, and she dropped her head slightly. All at once, Christen felt like she was overstepping, like she had to get out of this room and fast.

“Have… have you seen Tobin?” Ashlyn asked, swallowing back her tears.

Christen shook her head. “Not… not yet. I saved her for last.”

“You mean you’re avoiding her.”

Christen let out a slow breath. “I’m about to go see her.”

“Good.” Ashlyn raised her sunglasses so she could look Christen in the eye, squinting against the fluorescent lights. “You guys have got to stop this. Just talk to each other.”

“I know. I know.”

Kelley rolled her wheelchair into Tobin’s room and Christen wanted to throw up. Tobin’s face, her beautiful face with the cheekbones that Christen could never get enough of, was bruised and swollen almost to the point of being past recognition. Her nose was wrapped with white gauze. “Oh my god.”

Tobin turned her head slightly, her eyes barely able to open with all of the swelling. “Chris?” her voice was hoarse and raspy.

“Tobs- you-”

“You look like shit, Tobito.” Kelley’s bluntness made her laugh, which in turn made her clutch at her ribs. “Seriously dude. What the fuck?”

“Y’mean you don’t like my nose job?” She ghosted her fingers over the bandages. “Broke the shit out of my nose. They did surgery as soon as they got me here. The air bag did it’s best, but I didn’t have my seat belt on.” She licked at her lips. “Gotta concussion. Cracked ribs. Bruised lung. Oh and some wicked whiplash.”

“That’s insane.”

“Yeah.” Tobin stretched out a hand in Christen’s direction. “You okay?”

She nodded, taking her hand. “Concussion. Some bruises and cuts, nothing super serious.”

“Seatbelt?” Christen nodded. “Always the smart one.”

“I’m gonna give you guys a second, I’ll just be outside.”

Once Kelley left, the room was quiet apart from all of the machines. “I’m really sorry, Tobs.”

“It was a deer-”

“No. I’m sorry I kissed that guy. I’m sorry that I was jealous and upset, so instead of talking to you I got drunk and, and,” she choked back her tears, “ruined our lives.”

“Hey, not ruined. We’re alive.”

“My dad says I could go to juvie for this. What the fuck was I thinking?”

“We’re always thinking. That’s the problem. We’re always trying to stay a step ahead of each other, scared we’re going to get hurt, refusing to just say what we mean.”

“I know. And I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. Just talk.” She took a ragged breath. “Do you like me?”

“Tobs, you know how I-”

“Do you like me?”

“Yes.”

“Do you want to be my girlfriend?”

“I… yes. Yeah, I do.”

“Then what the fuck are we doing? Let’s just be together, without all of the other bullshit.”

“What about the blonde from last night?”

“Linds? She’s my bro. Nothing else, I promise.”

“That’s not what it-”

“Christen. Can you just trust me? For once? Lindsey has a boyfriend. Or she did anyway, they broke up a few weeks ago. She doesn’t even know she’s gay.”

“But she is?” Christen asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Based on the amount of time she spends talking about Sonnett, yeah. Like a fucking rainbow.”

“Oh. Well Sonnett hooked up with Kel last night.”

“’Bout time.”

“Are… are you sure you want to be with me? I know I can be a lot to handle, and from the sound of it, if the government doesn’t lock me up for the foreseeable future, my parents will.”

“’Course. Can’t wait to brag about my jailbird girlfriend.” Christen’s eyes welled up with tears and Tobin clumsily tugged her closer. “Hey, don’t cry. No crying, I was just trying to make a joke.”

“God, I really fucked everything up. And we’re all hurt, and Ali’s not talking to Ashlyn, and my parents, I’m sure your parents-”

“Shh… we fucked up, but we’re alive. Just gotta keep pushing forward, try to be better.”

Christen laid her head against Tobin’s thigh. “I think I might love you,” she whispered.

Tobin smiled as she finally let her eyes flutter shut. “I think I might love you, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Let's chat on tumblr, @thetheatrelady


End file.
